Prusa MINI Z-axis light bar

Add a light bar to your Prusa MINI while minimizing changes to its appearance (no horizontal overhead beams) to make it look more like a built-in feature! I used an 8mm-wide LED strip from IKEA with adjustable intensity settings, powered via a 5W USB power adapter.

There are two components: 1) light bar housing, 2) light diffuser.  The housing is printed in Prusament Jet Black PETG, and the diffuser is printed in Overture Transparent PETG with 100% Aligned Rectilinear infill and cooling off. Follow this guide for more tips on printing “glass”. 

To secure the light bar housing to the Prusa MINI, use 2x M5 T-slot nuts with M5x12 socket head screws (10mm might fit better) and insert M5 nuts in the T-slots. I slid the T-slot nuts into the Z-axis 3030 extrusion by loosening the top plate of the Z-axis carefully. After installing the LED strip in the housing, you can secure the diffuser to the housing with some hot glue on either end.

Due to the mounting location, the brightness is not as intense as overhead designs, but it is enough to make even a darker colored print clearly visible. This was tested with a Pi Cam module (via Octoprint).